“Well,” Hannah said as she stood at my desk, “the mother ship has landed, and our new overlords have come to inspect the furnishings, Janet. You know, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if the Hoviaks told us they ate live rats, which they swallow whole while their eyeballs turn blue and green and click upwards.
“Don’t tell anyone I said this,” [Hannah whispered now] “But I honestly do think the Hoviaks are a different breed, like they’re aliens or something, who’ve come to dominate us. They do it through seduction and violence, which is basically what they’re all about if you think about it, Janet. If you took seduction and violence out of the picture, the Hoviaks wouldn’t exist. I’d bet my bonus that a few of them are really reptiles deep down—except Mike, of course.”
Hannah was the master of conspiracy theories, so I smiled and nodded. She once said that the Civil War coincided with a surge of UFO sightings over the White House and Virginia. I attributed her fascination with conspiracy theories to her brilliance and the fact that her mind, the sharpest intellect I’ve ever known, was always in search of an explanation, no matter how extraordinary.
“Oh, nicknames!” Hannah whispered as she stood at my desk. “The only way to make a despicable situation manageable is to turn it upside down. We need nicknames for our new ‘consultants.’”
“I’m not getting fired,” I told Hannah. “Not now. Thank you very much, friend.”
“Fired for having a sense of humor? Come on, Janet. Wise up. No one’s going to fire you or me, not unless we do something outrageous, and there’s nothing outrageous about a nickname, especially when I’m seeing Mike tonight. So, I’ll come up with a nickname for Miriam, and you’ll come up with a nickname for Sheila.”
“Antonia for Sheila,” I said. “I can live with that.”
“Abigail for Miriam,” Hannah said. “See, not even offensive or inappropriate. What about the three hospice geriatrics?”
“Isn’t that offensive? They’re my parents’ age, Hannah.”
“Mine, too,” Hannah whispered, “which doesn’t make them any younger or more attractive. There are some really hot older guys who take good care of themselves. Those three are not hot, and they don’t really take care of themselves.”
“The tallest one is Wrinkles,” I said, caving in.
“Folds is the shortest one,” Hannah responded. “And the middle one is Creases. So, now we have Antonia, Abigail, Wrinkles, Creases, and Folds, and what about the married couple in the adjacent offices? Come on, Janet, indulge me a little here. Where’s your sense of humor?”
“They’re a stunning couple,” I said. “I wouldn’t even know what to call them. How do people like that even end up together?”
“I have a few ideas,” Hannah said, “not to be said in polite company.”
“You’re so naughty.” I smiled.
Hannah and I giggled.
I’d missed Hannah during my maternity leave. We’d texted every so often, but it was good to see her and have someone who responded like I did at WS&X: with a sense of amusement and outrage. I remembered her first two years at the firm. She was quiet, reserved, and she worked her ass off. People noticed, and they all wanted to work with her. Until he chose to work with Hannah in her third year, Larry never worked directly with associates in their first three years. Ever since, Hannah only worked with Larry, and occasionally, that is, rarely, with Amandine or Andy.
“I’ll name the husband,” I said. “Phyllis.”
“What?” Hannah blinked at me through her green-rimmed eyeglasses.
“Phyllis,” I said. “His name is Phyllis. That way, he’ll never know we’re talking about him. It also goes well with the times we’re living in. These days, parents give their children names traditionally reserved for the opposite sex. Girls are named ‘Heath,’ ‘Hunter,’ and ‘Haden.’ Boys are called ‘Moon,’ ‘Maple,’ and ‘Mercy.’”
“Well, alrighty then,” Hannah said. “I’ll call the woman, um, Joseph. Yep. Joseph. Oh, oh,” Hannah continued, “Joseph and Phyllis are standing outside their offices again. Let’s do voiceovers for them. I’m Joseph, and you’re Phyllis. Come on, Janet. Just live a little.”
Me as Phyllis: “You should learn algebra, Joseph.”
Hannah as Joseph: “How will it help me buy peas at ConfiPrice, Phyllis?”
As Phyllis: “Don’t you know there’s a famine coming up, and we need some silos to store peas, so we need people who love math?”
As Joseph: “But won’t my brothers be jealous if I’m really good at algebra?”
As Phyllis: “They might sell you into slavery, Joseph, but then you’ll have powerful dreams.”
As Joseph: “Powerful dreams? Is that what they call nightmares these days?”
As Phyllis: “Algebra, like dreams, is the language of symbols, and it helps you prepare in times of lean for times of plenty, and vice versa, Joseph.”
As Joseph: “I think I need the restroom.”
As Phyllis: “Remember to use the ladies’ restroom, Joseph. It’s always cleaner than the gents’ restroom. Some guys never wash their hands even after a number two. The Herald said some wear the same underwear several days in a row.”
Hannah and I high-fived each other.
“Ha-nnah!”
“Yes, Larry.”
Hannah blew her breath into her cheeks, which inflated them. She put on a smile and walked briskly into Larry’s office.
“Mike and Anton will be here in twenty,” Larry said. “I need you to summarize for them everything we’ve done on the Water Code since they were last here. Amandine and Andy will also be there, and I want Janet to take notes.”
“Sure,” Hannah said. “Whatever you need, Larry.”
“Anyway, my kids are driving me crazy,” Larry said, changing the subject. “So, Hudson just called me and said he no longer wants to be a lawyer, he wants to be a pastry chef because there’s a girl in his class who digs pastries, so he wants to impress her. I told him to just take her to Sequoia & Birch, and Michelle will prepare the best dessert she’ll ever have. ‘No, Dad,’ he says. ‘Girls like it better when you’re the man and you take care of stuff on your own.’”
Larry scratched his chin.
“It is what it is,” Larry told Hannah. “Lloyd hears this, and he gets on the line and wants to be an ‘ACT TOR,’ not an actor, like a normal human being, but an ‘ACT TOR,’ like they’re two separate words. One of those Hollywood types who’s been in a few D-list movies that go straight to TV visited them at school the other day and gave this fancy-pansy picture of an ‘ACT TOR’s life’ and how you get to shoot in fun places. So, now I have a pastry chef and an ‘act tor’ under one roof. Tell you one thing: don’t have kids. Have cats instead.”
“Oh-kay,” Hannah said as she walked out of Larry’s office.
I double-checked that the conference room was ready to receive the Hoviaks.
For any other client, that meant ensuring that the onsite kitchen delivered sparkling and natural water, fruit juices of various kinds, tea, coffee, and cookies to the conference room. It meant that the onsite IT department ensured that all audiovisual equipment and the computers in the room were working. It meant getting housekeeping to vacuum and dust the room again, which was also done each evening.
For the CWP, things were different.
Creases, Wrinkles, and Folds told me that “going forward,” a case of chilled Greenland glacier water had to be delivered to the room for Mike. For Anton, a case of chilled premium Indian tonic water with quinine had to be available. Anton and Mike never drank out of the bottle; the glasses had to be spotless and perfectly transparent. Coasters had to be placed to the right of their seats. A grilled tuna steak with asparagus had to be prepared for Mike, just in case he was “tempted,” and rabbit in a mustard sauce had to be prepared for Anton.
When I told the kitchen that they had less than an hour to prepare everything, Benjamin, the head of dining, sucked his teeth at me and put the phone down.
> I called him back and told him that “three gentlemen from our client, the California Water Party” would be in the kitchen throughout the preparation of the meals, monitoring everything. He sucked his teeth at me again, hissed, and put the phone down again.
For Larry, I ordered sushi with extra ginger and wasabi. For Amandine, farro tabbouleh with feta. For Andy, a double cheeseburger, fries, and a ginger ale.
Hannah and I just wanted coffee, so we had a pot of Ethiopian coffee delivered to the conference room.
For the “legal consultants,” who’d also be in attendance, I was told they’d eat on their own in the kitchen afterward. I should have the kitchen prepare three Reuben sandwiches, one egg salad sandwich, one breaded whiting sandwich with coleslaw, and a fried chicken and biscuit sandwich. Two herbed quinoa and chickpea salads, and one Thai mango salad with a peanut dressing also had to be prepared. A selection of juices and desserts should be available.
With the help of Antonia and Abigail, Phyllis and Joseph swept the conference room for security threats. Computers were removed from the room, and all audiovisual equipment was also removed. As housekeeping cleaned, they were followed around the room. I delivered the huge binders with the revised Water Code in them, and those, too, were checked page-by-page, and Antonia and Abigail patted me down.
All cell phones were surrendered as we entered, and the only cell phones allowed in the room were the blue phones the CWP had given Larry, Amandine, and Andy. The food was delivered by Folds, Creases, and Wrinkles.
The rabbit smelled wonderful.
My mouth watered.
Andy arrived with Amandine, and they took a seat across from us and waited for Larry. Larry walked into the room, shook hands with all of the Hoviaks, told them that it was great to see them, and WS&X was glad to have them. They nodded and smiled politely, like people do at outsiders trying desperately to belong.
Mike and Anton walked in, and Hannah shuffled her feet and smiled.
I grew tense.
There was something about Anton that made me increasingly uncomfortable. Maybe it was the whole Eleena story, but Anton reminded me of the first pressure cooker we owned. I was so worried that it might explode at any moment that the first few times I used it, I walked on tiptoes around it so as not to annoy it, which made Mauru laugh and ask what I was doing. I also found myself paralyzed in front of it as I prepared to release the pressure that had accumulated inside it. I was afraid the pressure cooker might explode or, if it didn’t, that it might scald me for getting too close. I just couldn’t bring myself to act appropriately around it and had to rely on Mauru to do so.
We all stood up and greeted Anton and Mike as they entered the room.
Jeremiah wouldn’t be joining them, they said, because he was on the campaign trail with other members of the party. He was spending the day up in Ojai before heading to Santa Barbara. The next day he’d be taking some time off in Solvang, which is known for its Danish cultural history, wonderful bakeries, and for its captivating architecture.
I thought, momentarily, of Eleena.
Why did everything coming out of the Southern African Federation seem so negative? Why couldn’t there be good, thrilling news of which we could all be proud, apart from the fact that it was where we were from and it had marvelous natural wonders to see? Whenever the region appeared on TV, it was about The Hatred, about corruption, and about the widespread suffering caused by the reckless policies of President Kuraya and his wife, Gorguessa.
Mike and Anton took seats at the head of the conference table, and Phyllis served them their chosen beverages. Joseph brought the meals in as Antonia and Abigail delivered green and blue napkins with “CWP” embroidered on them.
The Hoviaks all stood tall, which prompted us all to do the same. Then came Scrimmage, bits of which I was beginning to memorize, having heard it a few times.
“We believe in the Constitution of the United States of America, in our right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We believe in private property and in our constitutional right to defend it. We believe in the state of California, in its people, and in its need for strong moral leadership. We believe in one Right Path, one republic, indivisible, out of many, one. We believe in the seven moral postulates, delivered to put us back on the Right Path. We believe that without these moral postulates, we are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past and destroy our planet and ourselves. We believe that only the California Water Party has the vision to bring these postulates into being. These are our seven beliefs, and these are our seven moral postulates. We live and die by them:
Good morals and good water are the foundation of a healthy people.
When morals and water become polluted, we die.
We must avoid death at all costs.
We live by facing our moral and water issues.
These are life and death issues.
The Right Path wants us to thrive.
If we fail, destruction awaits.”
The Hoviaks all applauded energetically, including, Larry, Amandine, and Andy, who recited Scrimmage flawlessly and convincingly.
Anton took a sip of his tonic water with quinine and winked reflexively. Hannah and I looked at each other, and I remembered what Larry had said about being disrespectful, so I told myself to not react. Even if Anton were to spit across the table, I would not react.
Anton took another sip of tonic water and winked again before downing the entire glass. Antonia walked up to him and refilled his glass. Anton took both the fork and knife in his left hand and stabbed the rabbit with them, which caused the mustard sauce to be ejected onto the table.
“My Code?” Anton asked. “Where is it?” With a flick of his hand, he dismissed the plate before him. Antonia wiped the table and removed the plate with the rabbit from the room.
“Ready. It’s ready, Anton,” Larry said with a pile of sushi in front of him. “Ha-nnah.”
“There’s something you should know,” Mike said as he lifted the plate of tuna and asparagus to his nose. He gestured to Phyllis to taste the meal before he ate it. After tasting it, Phyllis nodded before providing Mike with a clean fork and knife.
“Don’t be alarmed,” Mike said, “when you all read in tomorrow’s Herald that four justices of the California Supreme Court are up for impeachment for renovating their homes with taxpayer money, including gold-plated faucets in their kitchens worth $25,000; $75,000 designer couches in their living rooms; and steam showers with platinum fixtures going for over $47,000. There are also videos of the chief justice paying an escort for intimacy, which will probably lead to her resignation over the next week. There’s a lot more we have on file. But that’s all the vultures at the Herald get for now.”
Mike picked up some asparagus with his fork, examined it, and put it back on his plate.
“The honorable justices,” he told us, “were contemplating ruling against us on some trivial matter, and they wouldn’t be dissuaded. We have four more compliant justices in mind. Governor Barrow will accept them. Our people at the California State Bar’s Commission on Judicial Nominees Evaluation will get us what we need, and we’ll have four new justices devoted to the environmental issues the people of California really care about, before this November’s election. We’re all friends here, so don’t be blindsided by non-news. This will also be a nice reminder to Chief Justice Cathay out in D.C.”
Andy cleared his throat, and Larry dipped his sushi in a mixture of wasabi and soy sauce before eating it.
Mike raised his eyebrows and stared squarely at Hannah.
“Cathay,” Mike said, “thinks he can tell us what to do because he’s most aligned with us on every issue, and he’s the swing vote. We have a lot on him, and we’ve done a lot for him, more than anyone knows. It’s not about blackmail but about keeping people on the Right Path, and sometimes that requires us to remind them of their pressure points. With people like Cathay, you never threaten. You gently and very respectfully remind them what they owe the people of
California. There might be a line or two in tomorrow’s Herald about Cathay’s questions at oral argument last week in a gerrymandering case. Ignore them. He’ll never ask that kind of stupid question again. If Cathay proves problematic, we have our ways of responding, and we also have two very hostile fallbacks on the Supreme Court who’ll be even more expensive than Cathay, but they’ll come on board if needed.
“Frankly, we’re getting a little tired of delivering our members and our money to satisfy other people’s needs in the early hours of the morning from D.C., to Sacramento. People are going to pay for what they’re making us do to belong. Our Water Code is going to be the law of California, come hell or high water, and the federal government will not touch it because it’s the Right Path. No one gets in the way of the Right Path, and the Right Path is just when it needs to be just, and forceful when it needs to be. Anyway, do you all know how many bills special interest groups have written in the past twenty years that legislatures have introduced verbatim for enactment into law?”
“21,300,” Hannah said.
“Yeah,” Mike agreed. “45 percent were written by the industry to be regulated, 40 percent by conservative organizations, 10 percent by liberal organizations, and 5 percent by others. Larry, how many of the 21,300 bills written by special interest groups are now the law of the land?”
“5,300,” Larry replied as he scratched his chin. “About one in four, Mike.”
“Great.” Mike sniffed his tuna again before breaking off a small piece with his fork. He took a sip of his Greenland glacier water.
“They’re called ‘model bills,’” Mike said after he swallowed his food and pressed the napkin to his lower lip. Mike presumed now to teach the lawyers the law, which I knew irked Larry, who tried to smile.
“These bills,” Mike continued, “make the work of the legislature so much easier that they can spend the people’s time attending our fundraisers for free. Tell us about the code you’ve had to redraft.”
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